Oscars 1945: Drunk with Success

The story of an alcoholic writer with a propensity for hiding liquor in the most unlikely places was a big winner on Oscar night, though the Billy Wilder drama wasn’t the easiest picture to get off the ground. Paramount balked at having the alcoholic played by anything other than a matinée idol, and matinée idol Ray Milland was advised not to touch the role. Preview audiences didn’t care too much for it, the liquor industry was none too thrilled either, and Paramount released it wide only after it received rave reviews during a limited-engagement run. At the awards ceremony, The Lost Weekend received Oscars for Best Picture, Best Director and Best Screenplay. Milland was presented the Best Actor trophy from Ingrid Bergman, who announced, “Mr. Milland, are you nervous? It’s yours!” Quipped host Bob Hope, “I’m surprised they just handed it to him. I thought they’d hide it in the chandelier.” The next day, co-screenwriter Charles Brackett and Wilder were greeted by a congratulatory gesture from fellow scribes—a series of little booze bottles hanging from strings outside each window of Paramount’s Writers’ Building.

BEST PICTURE
The Lost Weekend

BEST DIRECTOR
Billy Wilder, The Lost Weekend

BEST ACTOR
Ray Milland, The Lost Weekend

BEST ACTRESS
Joan Crawford, Mildred Pierce

BEST SUPPORTING ACTOR
James Dunn, A Tree Grows in Brooklyn

BEST SUPPORTING ACTRESS
Anne Revere, National Velvet

January 3

Ray Milland is born in Neath, Wales, 1905. The actor worked for the first time with director Billy WIlder in The Major and the Minor (1942), a comedy starring Milland as an army guy who befriends a grown woman (Ginger Rogers) passing herself off as a 12-year-old girl in order to acquire a cheaper train fare. When it came time to begin filming Wilder’s 1945 release, The Lost Weekend, Wilder looked to Jose Ferrer to portray Don Birnam, an author suffering from writer’s block and an addiction to booze. Paramount vetoed Ferrer, citing the need for more of a box office draw. Cary Grant and a handful of others turned Wilder down; Ray Milland did not and got the role of his career, with Wilder predicting that the actor would win the Academy Award. “On the day it dawned, I knew I couldn't face it and made up my mind not to attend,” Milland recalled about the Oscar ceremony, where he was up for Best Actor against Bing Crosby, Gene Kelly, Gregory Peck and Cornel Wilde. “At breakfast, I hesitantly told [my wife] Mal of my decision. She slowly put down her fork and just examined me. I didn't know where to look. Then she said, ‘I know that you're erratic, volatile, and the possessor of a foul temper. But I never thought you were a coward!’ Then with a look as cold as a Canadian nun, she said, ‘You'll go the that ceremony tonight if we have to put you in a straitjacket.’” He won and spoke no words of thanks, but instead bowed to the audience and exited the stage.